A Magician Never Reveals
by LittleMender
Summary: Tag to 3x20. Redacted. She had stuck her neck out for the 100 times umpteenth time, put her job on the line, her career, her ass, and all the master of mentalism, the wizard of words, the conveyor of crap could come up with was thank you?


**Judging by blogs and comment boards, we all took the last episode very seriously, for different reasons and with different takes on the final scenes. But almost anything can be humorous if you look at it the right way. I wasn't going to write a tag (I know, information specialist, I am fickle.), and this isn't so much a tag as it is a fantasy. Anyway, it keeps hovering, so here 'tis.**

A MAGICIAN NEVER REVEALS

_Thank you?_ That's all he had to say? A lousy _thank you_?

"_Well_," she shrugged to herself, _"He's had a rough couple of days. Guess I can't really blame him_."

Wait a minute.

Oh, yes. Yes, she could. She could blame him and fault him and slur him and curse him . . .

She had stuck her neck out for the umpteenth—no—the _100 times_ umpteenth time, put her job on the line, her career, her ass, and all the master of mentalism, the wizard of words, the _conveyor of crap_ could come up with was _thank you?_

At least this time it had been on her own terms. She had known she'd be suspended as surely as she had known that wouldn't be good enough for LaRoche, had been certain there would be more. _Anger Management_. She wanted to hit her head on her desk. Just drop it there, really hard. Maybe if she'd thought to do that _before_ she'd taken a swing at Donny Culpepper . . .

She'd known something was up all along. The Ted Fischer murder had been just the kind of case that Jane usually liked to sink his mental teeth into. Intrigue, hidden millions, corporate espionage, clandestine operations in a foreign country, a gullible weepy girlfriend. But every time she had looked at him, his face had been a mixture of blank and distracted, as if he were waiting for her to invite him to _think_.

And maybe she should have thought of _that_ before Jane went off half-cocked on this half-baked, half-assed scheme that nobody with half a brain would have ever dreamed of trying. If she'd known what he was doing, she would have issued just that invitation.

_Thank you?_

She pushed back from her desk, as if to stand and go after him. She could hear the kettle whistling just down the hall in the break room. Maybe now would be a good time to beat him up like she had threatened before he'd told her . . . gah—she couldn't even get her mind completely around everything he had told her.

_LaRoche has something I need, so I hired Culpepper to break into LaRoche's house._

_Hightower didn't murder anybody. She was framed._

_Red John has a friend inside the CBI._

_If it's not one of those names, then LaRoche is Red John's man._

_I didn't want to put you in danger._

How convenient.

She couldn't go after him now, couldn't make him talk. She didn't have the time. Her suspension started tomorrow, and all this paperwork had to be done before she left for the evening. Instead, she pulled out her phone and texted.

_Don't even think of leaving this building tonight without talking to me._

She smiled to herself when she heard the kettle bang back on the stove and knew he had purposely groaned loudly enough that she could hear. She just hoped he didn't start thinking too much. He'd be out of the building before she could say "pain in my ass".

Minelli, Sam, and Hightower—all three had warned her they were getting too close, and she hadn't really wanted to think too deeply about what they had meant by that (Minelli's disturbing hand gestures notwithstanding), preferring to interpret it as being too vested in the Red John case. But now LaRoche had started looking at them in that way of his that said _What exactly is going on here?_, and she didn't like it. Not one bit. Even if it was a question she had started asking herself more frequently, though perhaps for different reasons.

She looked down and grunted at her desktop. There was no way she would get out of here at a decent hour if she had to finish everything that was staring back up at her. And there was no way she could concentrate on any of it. Resolutely standing and grabbing her stuff, she headed out the door hitting "1" on her speed dial, knowing Jane had already headed upstairs. She had punched a suspect in a CBI holding cell today for seemingly no good reason. Surely she could handle something as daring as leaving unfinished paperwork.

"Lisbon?" Jane answered her call, that teasing tone from earlier still coloring his voice. _Good. He'll be completely caught off guard when I taser him._

"Meet me downstairs. We're leaving."

"Leaving? You had what looked like about two hours' worth of paperwork—"

"Your butt. Downstairs. Now."

She barely heard his sarcastic "Yes, _ma'am_" just before she snapped her phone shut and pocketed it.

He cleared the stairwell as she exited the elevator, and she smirked grimly with satisfaction as he fell into step just behind her, knowing he had to have scooted down the stairs to get there so quickly. Despite his attempt at brushing off the incident, he did realize the enormity of what she had done for him. That's probably why he had been so flippant about it. It was very satisfying how compliant he could be when had by the short hairs.

He followed her to her car and silently took his place in the front passenger's side, did up his seatbelt and sat back and waited for her to begin the conversation. She didn't speak until after they were inside the bar.

"The Mousetrap" was a dark and seedy dive by the docks, its parking lot sporting everything from pick-ups to motorcycles to an ancient Crown Vic. It looked like a set from a Tarantino film—just the sort of place she might bring him so someone _else_ could beat him up. But Jane knew appearances could be deceiving and decided not to question Lisbon's judgment or reason for bringing him to such a place. Upon stepping through the door, he saw he had been right about appearances. On the inside . . . it was even worse.

The lights were low, the air was clouded with something—he didn't know what since there was a no-smoking ordinance in the city—and it smelled strongly of alcohol. Not just the typical smell of whiskey, gin, beer and vodka in most bars but like copious amounts had been poured around the place, soaking into the very woodwork. He remembered the hangover from going undercover as an alcoholic in need of drastic remedial intervention and grimaced, feeling his stomach roil. There wasn't an un-tattooed piece of exposed skin in the place, many designs he recognized from his own time in the joint as prison art. The piercings could have stocked a mall costume jewelry store. The floor was sticky.

And after the few seconds it took him to take in his surroundings, he realized that every eye—_every_ eye in the place was focused on them.

Most of the patrons wore the familiar _We-know-a-cop-when-we-see-one_ scowl, but when Lisbon stepped to the bar and placed an order, requesting it be brought to the back table to which she pointed, they seemed to collectively relax. Now they surveyed Lisbon with a different sort of expression which Jane also recognized.

"Give me a beer and a reuben and a mushroom omelet. Oh, and . . . you don't by any chance have some hot tea?"

Jane could tell it almost embarrassed her to ask. The bartender regarded her, looking her up and down, rubbing his palm over his dirty t-shirt-covered paunch and rolling his toothpick around in his mouth before grunting an answer.

"Think Cook keeps some in the back."

She nodded and headed for the table. Jane thought it best to keep as close to her as possible, as the glances he was now getting were a lot less than friendly. Nobody liked a third wheel. He could feel the front of his jacket brushing against the back of hers when he leaned forward to stage whisper toward her ear.

"Uh, Lisbon? What are we doing here?"

She barely turned her head so he could hear her answer over the din that had resumed, not wanting to take her eyes completely off their surroundings.

"We need to talk, and I wanted to go somewhere I knew LaRoche probably wouldn't think to look for us."

"I don't think LaRoche even knows places like this exist," he replied. "As a matter of fact, I'm a little concerned _you_ know about it."

She casually responded as if it were information enough, "Before I was promoted to Serial Crimes lead I did a couple of favors for Vice."

Jane didn't even bother to hide the shock as he looked down at the back of her head. That was twice in less than two hours. The first was when she'd leaned into the punch she'd launched at Donny Culpepper's face.

They slid into opposite sides of the booth, and Jane recognized the setting as the perfect place for a confidential chat. The surrounding noise shielded their voices as the high backs of their seats offered a barrier against the sound. Lisbon seemed to settle in, but her intent focus on her clasped hands where they rested on the table belied her calm exterior. This was it then.

" _. . . We are going to have a serious talk after."_

He hadn't expected it so soon. He had thought he'd have more time. More time to think, to go back over what he'd said, to backtrack. He'd been honest in as much as he'd told her up in the attic. He guessed he could go along a little farther. It's not like he had to tell her everything. He just had to be careful not to give her anything solid to indicate just how long or how much he'd been holding out on her. As long as he didn't mention the poem. Their food was delivered, and he looked down at the omelet with suspicion. The eggs were laying on top of the mushrooms, which had apparently been sautéed in an obscene amount of real butter. It smelled delicious.

"How did you know Todd Johnson was connected to Red John?"

The question landed like a gut punch. Answering honestly would tell her everything.

"What kind of omelet is this? I've never seen one made like this."

"The short order cook is from Baton Rouge—worked in some restaurant there. Quit deflecting and answer the question."

She had cut her sandwich in half with the knife provided and took a bite followed by a swig of her beer and somehow never took her eyes off him. The very fact that he'd made such a lame attempt evidenced how shook up he still was and how caught off guard he'd been by the question.

"And don't lie. I'll know."

"No you won't, there's no way—"

"Jane."

He looked at her, lips pressed together in exasperation. He'd been looking at her like that a lot lately. She met his gaze full on, and he was chagrined to be the first to look away. His eyes moved back and forth, and she thought of a computer working through data. He was processing, trying to think of what and how much he should tell her.

"Eat your omelet. And drink your tea while it's hot."

She'd let it go until they finished eating. Now she was at least certain he was right about Todd Johnson's murder being related to Red John. Whatever he was hiding was too specific to be a wild goose—he had something definite. This bar was open all night until six in the morning. She had plenty of time. It's not like she had to be at work the next day.

Without conversation, even leisurely dining doesn't take long, and while the eggs and butter-simmered mushrooms were delicious and the tea was better than passing, Jane couldn't quite enjoy them as much as he ordinarily would have, feeling almost as if he were experiencing his last meal. The whole Culpepper thing must have thrown him more than he realized. He couldn't think of a way to explain away his knowledge of the Johnson-Red John link.

"How do you know Hightower's innocent?"

Was that a mercy pitch, or was she letting him squirm? She smirked at him, and he realized the thought must have shown on his face. Was she really getting better at reading him, or was he just letting his guard down with her more? She sat back and folded her arms across her torso just below her chest, fingers delicately resting on her upper arms. She looked her thanks up at the waitress for removing their plates then turned her gaze back to him, waiting for his answer. He resignedly dropped both hands into his lap.

"She told me so."

"Try again."

"She told me so, and I believed her."

She weighed his answer—weighed _him_—and seemed to accept it. "All right, you believed her. But if you thought Todd Johnson was connected to Red John and she may have killed him, you had to have believed _she_ was connected to Red John, and you wouldn't just let that go on her say-so. What else convinced you?"

"She didn't kill me."

"Once she used you to get away, she didn't need to."

"No—in the attic. She could've killed me in the attic, and she didn't."

She frowned at him. This wasn't getting her anywhere.

"Start at the beginning. With when you first suspected her. But first—" she interrupted herself, a thought having just struck her. "—now that you mention it, where did she get the gun?"

"What?" _Damn it. _She recognized the stall tactic.

"_The gun_," she repeated. "Her assistant saw her walk up the stairs but didn't mention the gun."

He raised one hand to the tabletop and traced a pattern with his thumb and forefinger, allowing his gaze to follow the movement.

"I may or may not have already had it."

"You. Had a gun. A CBI-issue slide action repeater. In the attic."

He pressed his lips together and half-shrugged.

"I may or may not have _borrowed_ your key to the armory."

She stared at him then blinked once slowly. She had that same expression she'd worn when she called him an idiot.

"How . . . " She closed her eyes and shook her head as if to shake away the question she had been about to ask and went with another instead. "When did you start to suspect her?"

"I didn't." He stilled the movement of his hand and looked up at her, his expression frank. "I mean, not at first. I went down to fingerprint and talked to the squirrely analyst. Saw the list of possibles, Madeleine's name on it, knew about her and Rance Howard and that Montero had supplied the gun Johnson had used to kill him and the other cops."

"And then you _stole_ my key to the armory and _commandeered_ a gun and _lured_ Hightower to the attic."

"Well, put like that, it makes me sound quite the action hero."

Her look went black, and she unconsciously played with the knife the waitress had left behind. He knew he was making a bad business worse.

"Yes. All of those."

She looked at him with that weighing look again, and he wondered what it was she searched for when she did that, wondered what she saw.

"When you confronted her, she convinced you she was innocent by not shooting you."

"Yes. And I could tell she was telling the truth, and that if she was telling the truth, someone—Red John's accomplice—was trying to frame her."

"And you let her tape a gun to the back of your neck—"

He opened his mouth as if to speak then dipped his head to one side in a half shrug again and squinted one eye at her.

"_You_ taped the gun—Jane, it was _your idea_? You didn't just help her—you _engineered_ her escape?"

Could he help it that she was making it all sound so complimentary? But he resisted preening. It had surprised (and impressed) him at how calm she had been from the moment her eyes had stopped rolling in her head after he told her he'd hired Culpepper. But he could certainly see her hackles rising now. Surprising him again, instead of yelling at him, her voice went low.

"If LaRoche finds out—"

"He can't find out Lisbon. He might be—"

"Red John's man, yeah, I know."

Her brow furrowed, and her eyes roamed back and forth across the tabletop. He had looked at the whole situation with an intense scrutiny until he was almost twitchy over contemplating the specifics, but as the tangle of conundrums was starting to unfold for Lisbon, all she saw was one big mess.

"So," she tried again. "LaRoche had boiled down his suspect pool to a short list of five." Jane nodded his encouragement that she was following the right train of thought. "And you think one of the four remaining names is Red John's plant." Another nod. "And if it's not one of them, it's probably LaRoche."

"Exactly."

"And you hired Donny Culpepper to go to LaRoche's house to find and steal the list."

". . . Yes."

"What makes you think he had it at his house? Wouldn't the more logical place be his office?"

Jane looked at her sheepishly. He was going to pull something with all of this shrugging.

"Jane!" she exploded angrily then leaned across the table and continued in a taut whisper. "You _searched_ LaRoche's office? You _did_, didn't you."

"Really, Lisbon, how can you act like any of this surprises you?"

She closed her gaping mouth and sat back in the booth, blinking her round eyes at him. He was right. Why was she surprised? Or shocked? This was him. This was Patrick Jane. This is what he does, what he is. And he wondered why she didn't trust him. He pulled back, looking almost hurt, and she realized he must have seen the thought on _her_ face this time. She had assumed this would be simple. She would ask the questions, and he would recognize the imperative of answering them clearly and honestly. When would she learn it was unwise, even unhealthy and potentially dangerous to assume anything with this man?

The waitress stopped by to ask if they needed anything else. Lisbon ordered a coffee (though she would have preferred something much stronger), and Jane motioned his cup at the server for a refill of tea.

Suddenly Lisbon felt like there was too much weight on her to allow for breath. It was late, and she was very tired. It had been a long weekend for her, too. She didn't want to delve into this too much right now. Maybe she could meet Jane in the morning, talk it over when she was fresh, her mind better able to absorb information and discern the right questions to ask him. Would LaRoche be suspicious of Jane leaving the office without explanation when she was away for the week? Probably. But it's not like his staying put would make the SCU boss think differently. But suspicious of what? That they were colluding? That they were trying to pull off a coup? That they were . . . ? She knew what the office gossips still wondered even after seven years, and after what her former bosses and friend had suspected—and she could only guess how the two of them must look to someone new on the scene. Hell, she even still caught the odd smirk from Rigsby. She fought the resurging urge to bang her head.

They could meet somewhere more private. And then she could really, actually beat the truth out of him. The truth about Todd Johnson. It rankled her that she had to have a strategy to get him to give her simple facts. She decided to go with some of the easier, less potentially damning things he had said to her earlier.

"So, what were your plans?"

"Plans?"

"About Culpepper. You said you had been trying to come up with a way to fix it all weekend. What did you come up with?"

"Well, there was nothing specific . . ."

Suddenly a memory from the past couple of days passed through her mind's eye, and she snickered into her coffee then set the cup down to wipe away the drabble from her chin.

"What?" he asked snippily, having obviously been distracted from the half-truth he'd been about to tell.

"You were making notes." She help up her hands, mimicking his pose as she remembered it. "On a little notepad. You never make notes." She snickered again.

He didn't know how he felt about her outright laughing at him over it. It had been a very trying time. He didn't remember the last time he'd felt so close to pure panic. He thought his next statement would impress her.

"I tried to get him to escape."

The snickering stopped immediately, but not in the way he'd intended. She choked back her laughter and really did try to take it seriously.

"Escape?" she asked, barely able to speak.

"Well, yeah." Why couldn't he stop shrugging? "I got a guard's ID and uniform and thought if he put them on I could sneak him out."

Her eyes were sparkling with unshed tears now.

"Sneak him out?"

"I sabotaged the guard's dinner."

"What did you do?" came out on a strangled whisper.

"I . . ." This was starting to sound pathetic even to him. He lowered his voice to a mumble. " . . . shook up his soda so it would spray all over the place."

She kept her mouth closed against the shriek she felt rising in her, but instead the laughter rumbled in the back of her throat and erupted out her nose with a snort. She was barely able to get herself under control.

"What were you going to do with him?" her voice high-pitched and broken with near hysterics and incredulity.

"Send him to Mexico."

"_Mexico?"_

"Why does everybody suddenly have a problem with Mexico?"

He seemed overly upset, almost offended about it. She didn't have a problem with Mexico. She just wondered why he assumed anybody would want to run away there.

"How were you going to get him there?" She was clutching her chest now.

It was painful for him to admit it. "I hadn't thought that far ahead yet."

"What were you going to do with him until you decided?"

"I don't know. Put him in my trunk?"

She couldn't fight it anymore and exploded with laughter.

"Jane, that has got to be the worst plan I've ever heard!"

"It would've been a perfectly good plan once I worked the kinks out."

"It's ridiculous!

"It is not. Just needed to be tweaked."

"Overhauled."

"Just a little."

"_It sucked!"_

He sighed deeply. She was right. It did suck. It was embarrassing. To be caught being so stupid by _Lisbon_ of all people. At least she didn't seem angry anymore.

"Why didn't you come to me?" No. She wasn't angry anymore. Though tears of laughter still shimmered in her eyes, now she just looked sad.

"I couldn't. It would have put you in danger," he repeated his earlier answer to the same question.

"You mean it would have endangered your plans."

He bristled at that, a ready denial on his lips, but his shoulders sagged before he muttered, defeated, "Both . . . but I really don't want you in danger."

He reached across the table and slid the knife away from her as she had nervously started to play with it again. She looked up at him, startled by the close proximity of his hand, and he realized it had been a long time since he had purposely come so close to touching her.

"I do want to protect you."

"I'm here to protect _you_, Jane. And I don't need a knight in shining armor. Haven't for a while now."

He looked up at her sadly. "Maybe. But you should have one all the same. And it _is_ my fault you're in this mess."

"I knew what I was doing when I punched Culpepper."

"I'm not talking about that." He looked down at the knife he now agitatedly toyed with then put it down and slid it away from him, having realized what he was doing.

"Jane. You don't blame yourself for the team being on the Red John case, do you?"

He sighed and shrugged again, unable to meet her eyes.

"Red John killed before you got involved. Even without you—even if he had never . . . We'd have the case even if you'd never come along," she finished quietly, knowing he wouldn't see the reason of that, would instead cling to self-recrimination.

"I feel like you're closer to it because of me. Or like he's closer to you. You—_all of you_ are more in his line of fire."

She watched him for a minute then reached across to still his hands where they continued to fidget on the tabletop in front of him, nothing to occupy them now. They stilled immediately under her touch, and he looked up to catch her next words, but she only sat smiling at him kindly, finally giving his hands a little squeeze before she let go.

She fished her cell phone out of her trouser pocket to check for messages. It had been switched off during their conversation, and she wanted to give it a quick look before leaving. He took it as a cue.

"Lisbon, I'm glad we had this talk. Now can we get out of here before we have to put that protection thing to the test?"

"I told you I don't need protecting."

He leaned across the table toward her and lowered his voice. "I wasn't talking about you."

She couldn't help laughing at him even as she corrected his earlier implied assumption. "And this is the first of many talks, Jane. There are questions I have. Questions I need answers to. And you _will_ answer."

He made to deny, but she stayed him. "I mean it. I said you owed me big time, and that includes all of the talking and asking and getting answers I want. Do you understand?"

"Is that all? Just talking?"

"No. It will include whatever I think necessary as I go along." The waitress stepped to their table with a look of purpose, and Lisbon continued in the high, sweet voice she reserved for mocking him. "Oh, look! Here's the check."

He accepted the ticket and pulled out his wallet, handing a couple of twenties back to the server, grumbling something about indentured servitude under his breath.

Lisbon laughed at him again and assured, "Don't worry. I'll be a kind task master."

She stood from the table as he put his wallet away, hooking her thumbs into her front trouser pockets. When he slid off of the bench, she offered him her elbow, which he took with a pained look. Walking out, he felt every eye on them again.

He watched her slide the SUV into gear and check every mirror twice before she pulled out of the parking space. They had gone a block before she couldn't stand it anymore.

"What?" she asked, knowing Jane studying her usually led to his version of a heart-to-heart and not really feeling up to it right now.

"You punched Donny Culpepper for me."

"You sound like a girl." She rolled the last word around in her mouth, the way she would have used it as a slur on a Chicago school playground when she was growing up.

"You saved me, Lisbon."

"I save you all the time."

"Stop . . . stop making this nothing. You saved me. From getting thrown out of the CBI, from prison, from the humiliation . . . from LaRoche's gloating over being right about me."

He reached out and laid two fingers on her hand where it wrapped around the steering wheel, making her gaze go to him.

"_Thank you."_

She tried not to look pleased and gave him only the smallest smile as she turned back to look at the road.

"You're welcome."

He withdrew his fingers, inadvertently stroking across the back of her hand.

He turned to look out at the road too, and they rode in silence for a while.

"So . . . vice."

"Mm."

"What exactly did you do there?"

"Never you mind."

"Oh, come on, Lisbon. You know what I did before I met you. You can tell me anything. I won't think less of you, I promise."

She hesitated and held her breath. "Only because you told me the truth."

She paused for effect. "I wore the skirt."

He looked at her waiting for more, and frowned at her when he could tell from her smug, self-satisfied expression that she wasn't going to say anything else.

"Come on. You've got to give me more than that. I told you the truth, remember?"

"No, Jane, " she said, letting the trap snap. "You told me _part_ of the truth."

He sat continuing to watch her, as if by making her uncomfortable, waiting her out, he could make her say more. When she didn't, he wondered if she really could tell when he lying.

She wheeled into the bureau parking lot and pulled to the front door to let him out. He stood, holding onto the door, looking into the car and across at her.

"You're not coming in?"

"Nope," she said, shaking her head at him.

"But all the paperwork—?"

"Cho's acting unit head for a week, starting tomorrow. He can act like the unit head." She looked out the front windshield then back at him and said tentatively, "Go easy on him, okay?"

He looked away from her, squinting into the darkness and bobbed his head to the side as he rubbed his hand up and down the front of his vest.

"Eh . . . I probably won't be coming in too much . . . Things to do."

"Like _what_?" She was almost daring him to come up with something legitimate.

"Well, I thought I might have lunch a couple of times with a friend. You know . . ." he looked back at her, ". . . to talk?"

He was sincere. He wanted the week to go by as quickly as possible for her, and if a couple of lunches and some shop talk would help her pass the time—well, it was the least he could do.

Her gaze turned serious, and she studied him with that look again, like she was searching for something. Apparently satisfied that he was being honest, or at least that he wasn't trying to pull a con, she looked away and shifted the vehicle into drive.

"Whatever, Jane."

He closed the door and watched her drive away before heading into the building, knowing that had been Lisbon-speak for _"Call me."_

She pulled out of the lot, thinking about their conversation, what was said and what wasn't. She knew he had been watching her, not only to try and get a read on her but to discern whether or not she was actually reading _him_ or just getting lucky a lot. She had told him a few months back that she could tell when he was lying. That was only a convoluted truth. Patrick Jane had no tells when he lied. His voice was even, he didn't break eye contact except to look down and to his left as if remembering a detail, his hands were still, and his features were perfectly and smoothly schooled.

His tells were in telling the truth. The way his fingers clenched slightly at his sides, his chin dropped just that fraction, and the subtle, haunting, pleading in his eyes as if he were subconsciously begging to be believed when he was intent on telling the truth. Or the nonchalant way he spoke and rubbed his vest, the squint and head roll when he acted like the truth didn't matter. Or the way, in the attic, the charm and smoothness fell away and the haggard showed through when he had tried to weigh his options and realized he didn't have any. These were the ways she saw him tell the truth, and in the absence of all of them, she saw the lies.

It was a spotty consolation at best, she knew. But she would never tell him, never let him know, never reveal what she had come to learn, and not just because she didn't want to put him on guard. Some part of her, hidden away, liked that she was the only one who knew. The only one who had seen. She had asked for the truth from him on more than one occasion, and he had given it—the truth and more. To her and her alone.

And she would never tell.

**END**


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